I am not sure that writers Cinco Paul and Ken Daurio, or director Chris Renaud, actually read Dr Seuss’ The Lorax before they adapted it for film. It is possible that perhaps they quickly perused the Wikipedia summary. This 2012 animated fantasy misses the point of the widely acclaimed children’s story, smashes its charming aesthetic with its own comparatively charmless equivalent, and buries its source material inside an anodyne and furiously vacillated framework. It is not simply poor quality entertainment; it is bad for your kids to watch it.

Here is the original Lorax in summary: a boy goes to a hermit on the edge of town to find out why there are no trees. That hermit, the “Onceler”, relates his own story. As a young man he finds a paradisical valley filled with beautiful trees with soft feather-like leaves, as well as a robust ecosystem of bears, birds, and fish. When he chops down a tree to use its leaves in manufacturing a garment – a so-called thneed, which is unwearable and useless – the Onceler is visited by the Lorax, a small magical creature who ‘speaks for the trees’. The thneed is an unexpected success. Despite the Lorax’s pleas for the Onceler to not cut down any more trees, and to cater to growing demand, the Onceler proceeds to undertake increasingly industrialised methods to raze the valley to the ground – decimating the environment and causing the entire animal population to leave. It is a famously blunt and remarkably bleak ecological fable, touching on issues of the environment, consumerism, selfishness, and compassion. I adored the book as a child. I continue to love it as an adult. Its central message is as compelling and relevant now as it was then – arguably even more so.

Admittedly it is a pretty short book, so Renaud’s film extends things. The framing device of the book is expanded into the core plot of the film. It focuses on Ted (Zac Efron), an impressionable 12 year-old boy living in plasticky Thneedville who goes looking for a live tree to impress a girl. That involves leaving Thneedville’s walled community to speak to the Onceler (Ed Helms), and discovering the world outside the town is a toxic wasteland. Residents have been kept in the dark by the film’s villain Aloysius O’Hare (Rob Riggle), who plans to sell clean air to the town for a profit.

This extended narratives muddies the strength of the original storyline. It minimises the participation of the titular Lorax, which is a deep shame because Danny DeVito performs the role extremely well. The book never needed a villain. By introducing one, the film gives the audience somebody to blame other than themselves. Much of Seuss’ lyrical prose is lost; what little remains is actually mocked by the film’s characters.

What is particularly weird is the thneed – a superbly thought-out analogue for runaway consumerism – is given purpose and use. It is a fundamental misunderstanding of the original text, and degrades it terribly.

The film is a musical, although its songs are forgettable and weak. It casts Taylor Swift in the lead female role and then does not have her sing.

Seuss’ book ends with a call to action to the reader: to learn from the Onceler’s mistakes and take action themselves in the real world. In Renaud’s film the narrative extends another 20 minutes, allowing Ted to act himself. Superficially it is an attempt to give the story a happy ending, rather than an uncertain and open-ended one. In practice, however, it lets the viewer off the hook in a way Seuss never does. The call to action is removed, and in its place the film offers trite complacency. Everything will be all right.

Everything will not be all right. Seuss offers truth. Renaud merely coddles. This is a toxic miscommunication of a vital lesson.